London and the Kingdom Volume I Part 25

This letter was followed by another from the king, dated from Greenwich, the 23rd June following, in which the Corporation was informed that for the a.s.surance of execution of the marriage treaty both parties had given pledges, and that the City of London was, among other cities and towns, included in letters obligatory to that effect, which letters he begged should be sealed without delay with the Common Seal of the City.(1017) And so, after the manner of the times, the boy of eight was married (by proxy) to the girl of twelve, amid great rejoicings in London (17 Dec., 1508).(1018)

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If Henry ama.s.sed wealth, it was not from any miserly motive. He well knew the value of the money, and that peace at home was never better secured than by a full treasury. He made, moreover, a princely use of his money, encouraging scholars.h.i.+p, music, and architecture, and dazzled the eyes of foreign amba.s.sadors with the splendour of his receptions. That he had a fine taste in building no one can deny who has once seen the chapel of King's College, Cambridge, or the chapel that bears his name at Westminster.

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Originally intended by Henry as a resting place for the remains of his uncle, Henry VI, the last mentioned edifice was diverted from its purposes and became the chantry as well as the tomb of Henry VII himself. Anxiety for his soul caused him to bind the Abbot of Westminster by heavy penalties to the due observance of his obit. These penalties were set out in six books or deeds, sealed with the Common Seal of the City of London, and formally delivered to the king by a deputation of the mayor and aldermen, who received in return a seventh book to remain in their custody. In 1504-the year that Pope Julius sanctioned the removal of the remains of Henry VI from Windsor to Westminster-the mayor and citizens formally sealed the "books" before the Master of the Rolls at the Guildhall. Two years later certain livery companies undertook to keep the king's obit on the day that the mayor for the time being went to take his oath at the Exchequer.(1019)

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The king died at his palace of Shene, recently renamed in his honour "Richmond," on the 22nd April,(1020) 1509. Just before his death he granted a general pardon and paid the debts of prisoners committed to the compters of London and to Ludgate for debts amounting to forty s.h.i.+llings or less.(1021) His corpse was conveyed from Richmond to St. Paul's on the 9th May, being met on its way at St. George's Bar, in Southwark, by the mayor, aldermen and a suite of 104 commoners, all in black clothing and all on horseback. The streets were lined with other members of the companies bearing torches, the lowest craft occupying the first place.

Next after the freemen of the city came the "strangers"-Easterlings, Frenchmen, Spaniards, Venetians, Genoese, Florentines and "Lukeners"-on horseback and on foot, also bearing torches.(1022) These took up their position in Gracechurch Street. Cornhill was occupied by the lower crafts, ordered in such a way that "the most wors.h.i.+pful crafts" stood next unto "Paules." A similar order was preserved the next day, when the corpse was removed from Saint Paul's to Westminster. The lowest crafts were placed nearest to the Cathedral, and the most wors.h.i.+pful next to Temple Bar, where the civic escort terminated. The mayor and aldermen proceeded to Westminster by water, to attend the "ma.s.se and offering." The mayor, with his mace in his hand, made his offering next after the Lord Chamberlain; those aldermen who had pa.s.sed the chair(1023) offered next after the Knights of the Garter, and before all "knights for the body"; whilst the aldermen who had not yet served as mayor made their offering after the knights.(1024)

When King Henry VIII was about to make an expedition to France in 1544, the Court of Aldermen gave notice to the Bishop of London that the obit of Henry VII would be kept on Friday, the 16th May, on which day there would be a general procession, and that the observance would be continued until the king departed out of the realm, and then on every Friday and Wednesday until his return.(1025)

CHAPTER XIII.

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One of the first acts of the new king was to grant Letters Patent absolving the City of all trespa.s.ses committed before the date of his accession,(1026) and to offer rest.i.tution to all who had suffered at the hands of Empson and Dudley or their agents. Empson and Dudley were themselves committed to the Tower and afterwards executed. In the meantime an enquiry was opened in the city as to recent proceedings against Capel and others.

It was found that six men, whose names were John Derby, _alias_ Wright, a bowyer, Richard Smyth, a carpenter, William Sympson, a fuller, Henry Stokton, a fishmonger, Thomas Yong, a saddler, and Robert Jakes, a shearman-all of whom had more than once been convicted of perjury, and on that account been struck off inquests-had contrived to get themselves replaced on the panel, and had been the chief movers in the recent actions against the late mayor and other officers of the city. They had, moreover, taken bribes for concealment of offences of forestalling and regrating.

Being found guilty, on their own confession, of having brought false charges against many of the aldermen, the Court of Common Council adjudged the whole of the accused to be disfranchised. Three of them, who were found more guilty than the rest, were sentenced to be taken from prison on the next market day, on horseback, without saddles, and with their faces turned towards the horses' tails, to the pillory on Cornhill. There they were to be set "their heddes in the holys" until proclamation of their crime and sentence was read. The lesser offenders were spared the pillory, but were condemned to attend on horseback at Cornhill, whence all the offenders were conducted to the Standard in Fleet Street "by the most high ways," where the proclamation was again read. The culprits were then taken back to prison and made to abjure the city on pain of imprisonment at the pleasure of the mayor and aldermen.(1027) Among the charges brought against Derby was one to the effect that being on a jury he had received the sum of ten s.h.i.+llings and "a quarter of ffisshe for his howsehold," a bribe which a suitor had tendered by the advice and counsel of Thomas Yong, saddler, who was apparently acting as Derby's accomplice.(1028)

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On the occasion of the king's coronation, which took place on Midsummer-day soon after his marriage with Catherine of Aragon, his brother's widow, the citizens presented the king and queen with the sum of 1,000 or 1,500 marks. Two-thirds of the gift was given expressly to the king, the remaining one-third being a tribute of respect to the queen. The money was to be raised in the city by way of a fifteenth, but the poor were not to be a.s.sessed.(1029) The procession from the Tower to Westminster was equal to, if it did not surpa.s.s, any spectacle that had yet been witnessed in the city for its gorgeousness and pomp. The streets were railed and barred from Gracechurch Street to Cheapside at the expense of the livery companies who lined the way,(1030) "beginning with base and meane occupations and so ascending to the wors.h.i.+pful crafts." The Goldsmiths of London were especially conspicuous for their marks of loyalty on that day. Their stalls, which were situate by the Old Change at the west end of Chepe, were occupied by fair maidens dressed in white and holding tapers of white wax, whilst priests in their robes stood by with censers of silver and incensed the king and queen as they pa.s.sed.(1031)

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After three years of indolent and luxurious ease Henry became embroiled in continental troubles. In 1511 a holy league had been formed for the purpose of driving the French out of the Milanese, and Henry's co-operation was desired. A parliament was summoned to meet early in the following year.(1032) After granting supplies(1033) it unanimously agreed that war should be proclaimed against France. The campaign of 1512 ended ingloriously, and the French king threatened to turn the tables on Henry and to invade England. Henry rose to the occasion and at once set about strengthening his navy. On the 30th January, 1513, he addressed a letter to the Corporation of London desiring them to furnish him with 300 men, the same to be at Greenwich by the 15th February at the latest.(1034) Proclamation was thereupon made in the city for all persons who were prepared to join the war to appear at the Guildhall any time before the 10th February, where, if approved, they would be furnished with sufficient harness and weapons, without any charge, and also with sufficient wages at the king's cost.(1035)

The city was suffering at the time from great scarcity of wheat, and each alderman was called upon to contribute the sum of 5 towards alleviating the distress which prevailed. A contract was made with certain Hanse merchants to furnish the city with 2,000 quarters of wheat and rye respectively by Midsummer-day, whilst the royal purveyors were forbidden to lay hands on wheat, malt or grain entering the port of London.(1036) Under the circ.u.mstances it could have been no great hards.h.i.+p, but rather an advantage to rid the city of 300 mouths. On the 1st February, 1513, the aldermen were instructed to enquire in their respective wards as to the number of men each ward could furnish, and two days later the livery companies were ordered to find the sum of 300 to defray the expense connected with fitting out the men. If more than 300 were needed they were to draw on the Chamber, but any money not expended out of that sum was to be paid into the Chamber.(1037) The companies raised the sum of 405, the Mercers contributing 35, the Grocers, Drapers, Fishmongers and Goldsmiths respectively 30, and the rest sums of smaller amount.(1038) There was some difference of opinion as to the nature of the uniform to be worn by the city's contingent. At length it was settled that the soldiers'

coats should be white, with a St. George's cross and sword, together with a rose, at the back and the same before. Their shoes were to be left to the discretion of the muster-masters.(1039)

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Henry himself now crossed over to France. The campaign proved more successful than the last, for the French being attacked at Guinegate, were seized with so great a panic that Henry achieved a bloodless victory. From the hasty flight of the French cavalry, the engagement came to be known as the Battle of Spurs. This victory secured the fall of Terouenne and was followed shortly afterwards by the capture of Tournay.

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Notwithstanding these successes, however, Henry found it necessary to make peace in the following year. His allies had got what they wanted, and the conquest of France was as far off as ever. It remained only to make as good a bargain as he could. The French king consented to the payment of a large sum of money, in return for which he was given Henry's sister Mary in marriage, although she was already affianced, if not married, to Prince Charles of Castile. This was the work of the king's new minister, Wolsey.

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To the apostles of the New Learning-as the revival of letters which commenced in the last reign came to be called-to Erasmus, to Archbishop Warham, to More and to Colet, the war at its outset had been eminently distasteful. With the accession of Henry VIII to the throne they had hoped for better things. War was to be for ever banished and a "new order" was to prevail.

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Of its connection with More and Colet the City is justly proud. At the opening of Henry's reign the future lord chancellor was executing the duties of the comparatively unimportant post of under-sheriff or judge of the Poultry Compter, a post which he continued to hold until 1517.(1040) He had received his education in the city at St. Antony's School in Threadneedle Street, a school which had already achieved a great reputation and afterwards reckoned among its pupils the famous Whitgift.

Later in life he shut himself up for four years in the Charterhouse of London, living a life of devotion and prayer, but without taking any vow.(1041)

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The father of John Colet, Dean of St. Paul's, had taken an active part in munic.i.p.al life. Henry Colet had been alderman first of Farringdon Ward Without and afterwards of the Wards of Castle Baynard and Cornhill,(1042) and as alderman of the last mentioned ward he had died towards the close of 1505. He had served as sheriff in 1477 and as mayor in 1486.

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Up to the time of Henry VI education had been carried on in the city chiefly by means of schools attached to the various city churches and religious houses. By order of Henry VI, and at the instigation of four city ministers,(1043) grammar schools were established in several parishes. The school of St. Antony attached to the hospital of the same name, of which Dr. John Carpenter was at the time master, received an endowment from Henry VI for the maintenance of scholars at Oxford. The school continued to flourish some time after the dissolution of the hospital. There was also a school attached to the hospital of St. Thomas of Acon, as famous in its day as that of St. Antony, but of which little is known until after the suppression of the religious houses by Henry VIII, when it pa.s.sed into the hands of the Mercers' Company and became known, as it is to this day, as the Mercers' School.

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The Dr. John Carpenter just mentioned must not be confounded with the Town Clerk of that name, the compiler of the famous _Liber Albus_ and the founder of the City of London School. There is little known of the foundation of this latter school beyond the statement made by Stow a century and a-half later, that he "gave tenements to the city for the finding and bringing up of four poor men's children with meat, drink, apparel, learning at the schools in the universities, etc., until they be preferred, and then others in their places for ever."(1044) Within the last few years the City Chamberlain's accounts-touching "the lands of Mr.

John Carpenter, sometyme commen clarke of this cittie"-have been brought to light, and serve to supplement in a small way Stow's meagre but valuable statement. The rental or amount with which the Chamberlain charged himself for the year 1565 or 1566 is there set down as 41 0_s._ 4_d._, and the discharge-embracing a quit rent due to the Dean and Chapter of Westminster, and expenses incurred in overseeing, clothing and feeding four poor children "being founde at scoole and lerning by the bequeste of the sayde Master Carpenter"-amounted to 19 12_s._ 8_d._, leaving a balance to the City of 21 7_s._ 8_d._(1045) From so modest a beginning arose the school which, situate on the Thames Embankment, now numbers over 700 scholars.

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There was a school attached to St. Paul's long before Colet's day, just as there is one now, independent of the school of Colet's foundation, and devoted mainly to the instruction of the Cathedral choristers. Soon after Colet's appointment to the Deanery in 1505 he experienced no little dissatisfaction with the Cathedral School, where great laxity prevailed, more especially in the religious education of the "children of Paul's,"

and so, about the year 1509-the year of Henry's accession-having recently come into a considerable estate by the death of his father, he set about acquiring a small property situate at the east end of St. Paul's Church for the purpose of establis.h.i.+ng another school which would better realise his own ideal of what a school should be than the existing Cathedral School. Colet's School grew apace. In 1511 he was in negotiation with the Court of Aldermen for the purchase "of a certen grounde of the citie for an entre to be hadde into his new gramer scole."(1046) By January of the next year (1512) he had succeeded in obtaining the a.s.sent both of the Court of Aldermen and Common Council to the purchase by him of a "certen grounde in the Olde Chaunge for the inlargyng of his gramer scole in Powly's Churcheyerd" for the sum of 30.(1047) The property was conveyed to him by deed, dated the 27th September, which deed was sealed with the common seal on the 7th October following.(1048) The question as to whom he should entrust the management of his school caused Colet no little anxiety. He eventually decided to confide its revenues and management entirely to the Mercers' Company, and when asked the reason for his so doing replied that "though there was nothing certain in human affairs he yet found the least corruption in them."(1049)

Considerable rivalry existed among the various grammar schools of the city, more especially between the boys of Colet's School and the boys of the more ancient foundation of St. Antony, which, for a long time, had the reputation for turning out the best scholars. Public disputations were held in the open air. The St. Paul's boys meeting St. Antony's boys would derisively call them St. Antony's pigs, that saint being generally represented with a pig following him, and challenge them to a disputation; the latter would retaliate by styling their rivals "pigeons of St.

Paul's," from the bird which then, as now, frequented St. Paul's Churchyard. From questions of grammar, writes Stow,(1050) they usually fell to blows "with their satchels full of books, many times in great heaps, that they troubled the streets and pa.s.sengers." After the decay of St. Antony's School the rivalry was taken up, but in a more friendly way, by the later foundation of the Merchant Taylors' School.

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But the citizens of London did not limit their efforts in the cause of education to their own city. Throughout the country there are to be found grammar schools which owe their establishment to the liberal-mindedness and open-handed generosity of the city merchant.(1051) Their existence bears testimony to the kindly feeling which men who had grown rich in London still bore to the provincial town or village which gave them birth and which they had left in early life to seek their fortune in the great metropolis.

To take but a few instances: Sir John Percival, a merchant-tailor, who in 1487 filled the subordinate office of Lord Mayor's carver, performing his duties so well that the mayor, Sir Henry Colet, nominated him one of the sheriffs for the year ensuing by the time honoured custom of drinking to him at a public dinner, founded a school at Macclesfield. Stephen Jenyns, another merchant-tailor, did the same thing at Wolverhampton. Sir Thomas White, another member of the same company, founded two schools in the provinces, one at Reading and another at Bristol, besides the College of St. John at Oxford. Sir William Harper, yet another merchant-tailor, established a school at Bedford.

The Mercers' Company rivalled the Merchant-Taylors' in the number of schools established in the country through the liberality of its members.

Sir John Gresham founded one at Holt, in Norfolk; Sir Rowland Hill, an ancestor of the originator of the Penny Postal scheme, another at Drayton, in Shrops.h.i.+re; whilst schools at Horsham, in Suss.e.x, and West Lavington, in Wilts.h.i.+re, were erected by two other mercers, Richard Collier and William Dauntsey. There exist at the present day at least four schools which owe their foundation to wealthy members of the Grocers' Company, the well known school at Oundle, co. Northampton, upon which the Company have expended on capital account the sum of 35,000, having been founded by Sir William Laxton; another at Sevenoaks, in Kent, by William Sevenoke, a native of the place, who rose from very humble circ.u.mstances to the chief magistracy of the city; another at Witney, in Oxfords.h.i.+re, by Henry Box, and another at Colwall, co. Hereford, by Humphry Walwyn. Sir Andrew Judd, a member of the Skinners' Company, established a school at Tonbridge, whilst Sir Wolstan Dixie, another skinner, performed the same charitable act at Market Bosworth. Lastly, Sir George Monoux and Thomas Russell, both of them members of the Drapers' Company, founded schools at Walthamstow and at Barton-under-Needwood, co. Stafford, respectively.

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On the Feast of St. Matthew (21 Sept.), 1515, a messenger arrived in the city from Wolsey desiring the mayor and aldermen to attend that evening at St. Paul's to return thanks to Almighty G.o.d for the queen, who was quick with child. The summons was obeyed,(1052) and in the following February (1516) the Princess Mary was born.

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By this time Wolsey had risen to be a great power in the State. In 1514 he had been made Archbishop of York, and in the following year a cardinal.

His high position as a prince of the Church, as well as his authority with the king, rendered it desirable for the citizens to keep well with him. On the 6th March, 1516, it was resolved to send a deputation to the cardinal for the purpose of securing his favour. No expense was to be spared in the matter, and all costs and charges were to be paid by the Chamber.(1053) In the following June the cardinal handed to the mayor a list of abuses in the city which required reform. Sedition was rife there; the commons were disobedient, the statute of apparel was ignored, vagabonds and masterless folk resorted there and unlawful games were allowed in houses. The king's council required an answer on these points within a few days, and an answer was accordingly given, but the purport of it is not recorded, although it was read to the Court of Aldermen before being despatched.(1054)